I picked up a book on Stoicism - “The Stoic Challenge - A philosopher’s guide to becoming a tougher, calmer and more resilient” - as a way to see if the author, William B. Irvine, could offer some tips on dealing with setbacks. Just like everyone else, I’ve had a fair share of those, more so in the past 10 years. My resilience and ability to stay calm have gotten smaller somehow due to being exposed to the deaths of loved ones, work-related lay-offs, and being constantly torn between my obligations as a mother and as a working professional. I am reading more to understand what I can potentially do better to improve the quality of my life and, in the process, to become a better role model for my kids. They will do what I do, not what I say…
This book piqued my interest, as it was suggested by Daniel Pink, whom I hold in high regard as an author and a motivational speaker. The author William B. Irvine stated the following in the introduction of the book, which immediately grabbed my attention:
We can, in particular, develop our ability to stay calm, even in the face of very significant setbacks, and this in turn can have a dramatic impact on our quality of life.
And this quote on the Stoic philosophers, who believed that the emotional cost of a setback was far greater than the physical cost:
Their goal wasn’t to banish emotion but to minimize the number of negative emotions - such as feelings of frustration, anger, grief, and envy - that they experienced. They had nothing against the experience of positive emotions, including delight and even joy.
One of the suggestions in Mr. Irvine’s book is to keep a setback journal, which seems like a trivial task, yet teaches us to analyze our setbacks daily and rate ourselves on our ability to handle them. I have a gratitude journal, where I record 3 things I am grateful for every day, but having a setback journal was a new concept to me. You record what you consider obstacles in your day and then see how you handle them. As per the author, there are 2 things you should consider when grading yourself on handling a setback:
How you conduct your search for a workaround to that setback, whether your solution was optimal
Your emotional response to the setback - were you calm and collected, or were you experiencing thoughts of anger and frustration?
Last week, as I started reading this book, which I finished several days ago, I experienced what I considered a major setback. An air conditioner in my car stopped working, and I was practically suffocating in my car while driving my son home from work. The temperature outside was 96 degrees Fahrenheit, yet inside the car, it felt like Ray Bradbury’s Fahrenheit 451 degrees. As I was driving, my sister called me on my cell, and I responded, putting her on the speaker on the dashboard and spilling all the anger and negativity on her, while describing the incident. As I finished the call, my son turned to me in the front passenger seat and said the following, which made me emotional, but in a positive way:
Mom, I don’t want you to get upset even more, but how is complaining to your sister about this situation helpful? It didn’t solve the problem and you felt more upset, while describing it to her. If it helps, I will give you my next paycheck to fix the air conditioner, just stay calm.
I wanted to cry, as he dealt with this setback in a more mature way than I did. It’s as if he read the book and not me. He sat in the same car as me, but he didn’t say a word about being hot. He accepted his circumstances and instead started chugging on his water bottle, then offered a solution to me. I, however, in William B. Irvine’s definition of scoring a setback, failed because I didn’t find an optimal solution, and because I became highly emotional in my response to it.
The other biggest nugget of wisdom that I gained from the book is that you should treat setbacks as tests from God or the universe, whatever your preference might be, and if you master handling them bravely, you become a stronger individual:
As strange as it may seem, experiencing too much comfort will reduce your capacity for experiencing pleasure. As Seneca put it, “When mind and body have been corrupted by pleasure, nothing seems bearable - not because the things which you suffer are hard, but because you are soft.”
Thinking back to my air conditioner issue, I felt like the quote above was describing me, having a meltdown over a high temperature, something my ancestors lived without all their lives.
This week was different, though. Tuesday, as I was finishing this book, God sent me a multitude of small tests, all in one day. I overslept, and as a result, I couldn’t drop off my son for his lifeguarding drills on time. If you don’t do the drills every Tuesday, you can’t work, so Michael was prohibited from working until Thursday, when he could make up the drills at another pool. Typically, Michael skips rowing on Tuesdays because his drills are at the same time. Suffering a pounding headache, I suggested that Michael go rowing instead. That, however, didn’t solve the problem of being unable to lifeguard until Thursday. I reached out to Michael’s manager, profusely apologizing for oversleeping. I asked if there was another pool that Michael could do his drills at before Thursday, and sure enough, she recommended one, but a more distantly located one. I thought that would work. As Michael was rowing, I decided to row as well, but on a machine at home. As I started rowing, my husband called, not for any specific reason, but for an impromptu chat with me, to relay his experience of talking to a friend of his. Inside, I felt a wave of irritation rise as my workout was interrupted, but then I thought, why am I getting so worked up? It’s not the end of the world, I can restart the 5K race and my time on the watch as well. I listened to my husband talk for 15 minutes, wished him a good day, and hung up. When I put my headphones on to listen to the music, while rowing, my iPods somehow unpaired. What the hell, I thought? Why does it all have to happen at the same time? I went online, looked up how to pair my iPods, as I have not done that in a while, and paired them. Then I resumed my rowing and somehow shaved 50 seconds off of 5K on a new resistance level of 12. My headache was gone, which I found surprising, as I felt like skipping the workout because of it. I went on to buy a sandwich for my son to treat him. It might not have been the best thing to do, but I felt guilty about the messed-up schedule for him (later, I’d talk to him about setting his alarm clock as well, so we rely on two alarms, not just one). I waited in a drive-through for his sandwich for 15 minutes. I didn’t feel irritated at all, as my headache was gone, and despite all the mini-setbacks, I was able to finish my workout and finish it quicker. Once the sandwich was prepared, the cashier, though, asked if I’d like to have a free bakery item for my wait. Sure, I said. To my surprise, I was given two bakery items of my choice. It’s like I was rewarded for being calm, I thought. Once I took off to pick up my son from rowing, a truck with a fridge inside it kept going 20 miles on a one-lane road. I was the fifth car behind it. I rolled my eyes, but then thought that his priority was different from mine - he didn’t want his fridge to tip over, while I wanted to get to my final destination faster. He was not intentionally trying to make me and four other drivers suffer. I took a breath in and out, and 15-20 seconds later, the truck turned right and cleared the lane for cars behind it. The biggest setback for me was when I arrived to pick up my son from rowing. Michael looked sad. I asked what was wrong, and he slowly told me that he broke a foot stretcher in his boat. Once he and the other rowers got on the Ohio River, his boat got stuck on a wooden log, from which he could not detach it. He had to jump into the river, push the log out, and pull the boat away from it. My heart skipped a beat as I was listening to his recollection of events. Then came the part he was so upset about - the log dented the boat. Screw the log, I thought, you are alive and that's what matters to me. I reminded him that the boat was insured, so both the foot stretcher and the boat itself could be fixed. He felt a little better. I reminded him that in the big scheme of things, his life was more precious than any boat. He didn’t yet know that a day later, he’d save the life of a drowning kid during his lifeguard shift and how big and impactful it would feel.
Overall, as I analyzed my Tuesday setbacks, I gave myself a B-, as I still reacted to the setbacks, yet quickly pushed my subconscious thoughts into my consciousness, reframing and questioning my thinking. That’s what I lacked with my air conditioning meltdown, the test I got an F on.
If you have time, I highly recommend reading this book, as it left a memorable impression on me. As as result of reading it, I am actively trying to reframe my thinking by keeping a journal and responding differently to setbacks.